


Once More Without Sensation

by staringatstars



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Lich!Taako
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-29
Updated: 2017-09-29
Packaged: 2019-01-06 21:35:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12219399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/staringatstars/pseuds/staringatstars
Summary: A series of scenes in a universe where Taako decided to become a tiny bit dead, then went back in time so he could tag along with the Horny Boys on their journey.





	Once More Without Sensation

Getting their happy ending felt strange. Not undeserved, certainly, but unexpected. Unlike Lup, who had never lost faith in a future where Magnus wasn’t constantly healing from the same black eye, Taako had fallen into apathy. At some point, and so gradually he hadn’t realized it until it was too late, he’d given up on a happy ending, had forsaken the thought of settling down for a pipe dream. 

He’d seen the end of the world more times than he cared to keep track of, though he couldn’t help but do it, anyway. (And did he count the town of Refuge and all the wondrous additional deaths it’d given him? The jury was still out on that one.)

He wasn’t expecting anyone to be awake. Lup had synced her meditation schedule to Barold’s and most humans needed roughly eight hours of sleep to be fully functioning, so he’d imagined he’d finally have some time to himself. 

He should have known better. 

“Taako?” Barry’s voice, gruff and gravely with sleep, called to him from the kitchen doorway. “What are you doing here?”

After throwing up a glamour before his practically brother-in-law could flip the light switch, Taako greeted him with a breezy, “Sup, Care-Bare.” 

Once the room was illuminated, Taako was given the chance to fully appreciate the raised brow Barry had crawling up his forehead. “I think your nicknames have actually gotten worse over the years.” He chuckled at his own joke as he moved to join Taako at the table. 

“Yeah?” Taako watched him pull out a chair without blinking. There were some mannerisms elves adopted solely to put humans more at ease, and the high wizard wasn’t in the mood for any of them. Instead, he dragged his nails over the table’s surface, peeling away curls of wood at his fingertips. “I think you’d know better than I would about something like that.”

Barry hummed, choosing to wait him out. It was always the best way to deal with him when he got like this. Rising to the bait only prolonged the time it would take for Taako to talk about what was eating him. After a long minute of silence, Taako finally sighed. Lowering his head so that it rested on the table and brushed against the crook of his elbow, he muttered, “I found her, Barry. I found her.” And Barry stiffened, but didn’t speak, knowing that if he did he’d never get Taako to open up again. “I watched her body turn to ash and I didn’t feel a thing.” His long, slender fingers curled into fists as he looked up to catch Barry’s eye. “I watched you die.” 

“Yeah, well,” for a moment, he floundered, because making light of the situation could only spell disaster, but what else could he do? “…you didn’t really know me.”

Taako sat up, his mind immediately flying to the body of a guy he’d barely known incinerated by an unstoppable blaze. “I don’t mean- I don’t mean, _then._ ” 

And Barry waited for him to continue, endlessly patient. 

Settling back against his seat, Taako pulled in a deep breath, then explained, “Ever since I can remember I’ve had these dreams about some guy I don’t know begging me to kill him.” It took a surprising amount of self-control for Barry not to interject right there. All of it, in fact. “I can’t really make out his face and his voice is all garbled.” He almost wanted to tell Taako to stop, because he remembered this, and it was one of the worst moments of his life, but Taako kept speaking with an empty, humorless smile, “I guess I must have shot him because he goes flying over the railing, but a second before he’s gone for good I see him smile at me, and I never knew why. Until now, I’d always chalked it up to my fucked up subconscious or something.” His arms wrapped around himself as a shudder worked its way through his body. “Now I know I murdered my best friend, and then a decade later I desecrated my sister’s corpse.” Lifting a fist listlessly, he muttered under his breath, “Go Team Taako.”

Laying a hand on his wrist, Barry gently reminded him, “But she’s back now. You know that.” 

It didn’t erase the doubt and - dare he even think it? - _fear_ from Taako’s clouded features. “For how long? Over a century of memories were gone in a second, Barold. And Lup. What am I supposed to do with that? How do I know I haven’t already forgotten something or someone important if there’s no way to tell?”

He was waiting for an answer, for a solution. But Barry had been asking himself that same question for a decade and had yet to arrive at any conclusion that could keep him from repeating his name and Lup’s name and short facts about his life every time he woke up in the morning. “I wish I could tell ya, Taako. But the truth is that’s a thought that haunts me, everyday.” At the disappointment evident on the other man’s face, his grip on the elf’s wrist tightened. This conversation felt important, somehow. And something told him he’d already made a misstep. 

Pulling away from him, slowly and casually so as not to alarm his sort-of human brother, Taako plucked his hat from his head. “But you’d remember,” and the wizard stared meaningfully at the accessory as he turned it over in his hands with a dangerous gleam in his eyes, “wouldn’t you, Bluejeans?”

 

* * *

 

_**That was the last conversation you ever had with the wizard, Taako.** _

 

* * *

It was at a young age that Taako realized he wasn’t quite like the other elves in Newelfingtown. For one, he admired humans, and actively sought out their company despite their short lifespans. Though he thought it was hysterical how much time they wasted over petty squabbles when their lives were so short, the way they lived their lives from moment to moment, as though they could end at any second so each one had to count, stirred some unnamed desire inside him. 

He wasn’t born to be stationary. The road called to him, so though the loss of his parents saddened him, he couldn’t help but see it as the chance he’d been waiting for. The only problem was he wasn’t old enough to travel on his own yet, and thus had to stomach being shuffled from relative to relative for a time, none of whom understood or even made the attempt to understand him. 

He learned that he could only trust himself, could only rely on himself.

And his floating invisible lich friend. 

It didn’t speak much. Taako learned to listen when it did, because it was usually important , like warning him off an alley with a mugger waiting inside of it, but when it came to Sazed, a young tiefling he’d met after finally striking it out on his own and starting his own cooking show, he’d flat out refused to heed its warnings.

Sazed was a whirlwind. He was magnetic, electric, and devastatingly charismatic. He had an ambition, a drive that inevitably pulled Taako towards him, but the elf made a mistake. He was greedy. He didn’t want to share the crowds with Sazed, and he didn’t want to share Sazed with the crowds. He was afraid that if the man got more than a taste of fame, he’d realize he didn’t need Taako and start a show of his own.

It wasn’t long after he and Sazed had enaged in a somewhat heated discussion about his involvement in the show, as he was quite obviously trying to create his own brand, that Taako became upset with his lich for the first time. There was no time to taste test the chicken he’d made before the show started, so Taako placed the meal and a garnish he’d hurriedly transmuted onto several platters for samples, then opened up his trailer to the assembled watchers, only to discover that the meal he’d prepared had gone up in flames the instant he’d uncovered the van. 

There were no ovens or stovetops on, the pans were all soaking in the sink. And though an electrical spark could have theoretically set fire to one, it couldn’t have demolished each of them simultaneously, nor extinguished itself as suddenly as it’d appeared. 

Forced to cancel the show, Taako refused to talk to his lich for days, until one night, he discovered a bottle of arsenic under his pillow from an apothecary. Since he doubted that the lich would actually try to kill him, he scryed for the owner of the bottle, and was pointed in the direction of Sazed’s tent. 

He burst in, not sure if he wanted to kill him or just ask him why, but Sazed was already choking, his fingertips and lips blue. Taako ended up wasting a healing spell on him so he could drag him, kicking and screaming, back to the town with the bottle of arsenic as evidence of attempted murder and mass poisoning.

 

**Here There Be Gerblins**

_You found her._

Taako paused with his hand outstretched, still hovering over the cane that had just blasted Merle across the cave. It’d been a while since he’d seen his lich friend. After he’d grouped with Magnus and Merle and was subsequently hired by the Bureau of Balance, its appearances had grown infrequent, and when it was around, it had a tendency to float aimlessly around his companions, both of whom were blissfully unaware of its presence.

It had caused Taako the embarrassment of getting caught staring more than once. 

Before, when Taako had decided to run away, it’d been full of good advice, instilling a set of survival skills in him that were sure to come in handy now that he was a Reclaimer, but now it rarely spoke, not even to comment sarcastically like it sometimes did. 

As his fingers slid around the wooden handle, Taako muttered under his breath, knowing that lich would hear, “Was this a friend of yours?”

Instead of answering, it drifted towards the wizard and the crimson robed skeleton at his feet, then watched as Taako yanked free an umbrella that felt strangely familiar and right in his grasp. “Well,” he held it aloft, bemused, “I have an umbrella now.”

Killian returned soon after to browbeat them for leaving, even though they basically had the attention spans of toddlers and thus couldn’t be held at fault for not staying in one place for five minutes, and then Gunther – Or was it Gertrude? Didn’t Dwarf women have bushy beards too? – Merle’s cousin came back and an altercation immediately broke out. It turned out that Gutenheimer really hated orcs. 

After awhile, the fight demanded Taako’s full attention, specifically after Gundam snatched the gauntlet from his father’s charred skeleton, and Taako wanted to say something about how bad of an idea it was to steal from a corpse, but wisely realized he didn’t have a leg to stand on. Immediately after Merle’s cousin blasted through the cave wall with a power he couldn’t control to lead them on a merry chase across a town gone up in flames, he glanced over his shoulder to see his lich floating soundlessly beside the pile of dust and tattered fabric that remained of the umbrella’s former wielder, and it was there that it remained for some time, its head bowed as though in mourning.

 

When the specter failed to make an appearance during their first meeting with the Director, Taako hadn’t thought much of it. Like him, his lich did and went where it wanted, so the absence didn’t both him. It was when the lich missed the second meeting, and the third, when it would see Lucretia striding through the halls with a determined set to her jaw and promptly vanish, that the wizard began to have his doubts. 

Maybe living under the roof of people who were actively trying to hunt the Red Robes down was getting to them, after all. Were they worried that Taako would eventually change his mind about hiding the lich’s existence and turn them in to the Director? Because that was ridiculous. 

The Director hadn’t been there when he was a kid, hadn’t shown him how to survive on the streets until he was old enough to make something of himself. Sure, she seemed nice enough, but she hadn’t earned the kind of loyalty that would sway him into giving up the first friend he’d ever had. 

Even when he’d had nothing, he’d never been alone. 

It was while they were reading a magazine in his quarters, with the lich floating over his shoulder as Taako combed through the celebrity gossip column, that he made a genuine attempt to reassure his transparent guardian, “Look, my man,” the lich’s long slender ears perked at the address, “if you’re worried about me ratting you out to the fuzz, it ain’t gonna happen, ca-pi-che?” Baring his pointed teeth in cocky grin, the wizard finished his sincerity quota for the day with, “I got you.”

For a moment, the lich’s outline seemed to shimmer. It became unfocused and shivery, its shoulders beginning to shudder, and Taako put the magazine down as he became worried, until it dawned on him that the lich was actually laughing at him.

Although aware that any physical objects would only pass through it, Taako swiped half-heartedly at the lich, met the usual zero resistance, and proceeded to cross his arms over his chest with a petulant pout when the lich renewed its dry cackles with additional fervor.

 

_**Crystal Kingdom** _

_Don’t. No. Stop. He’s incorporeal, you moron._

Taako and Merle had been watching Magnus try to punch the living daylights out of an undead creature for a solid minute before the elf heard the frustrated hiss, and looked up to see his lich hovering above his shoulder. The others couldn’t see it, so that hadn’t changed, but it was surprising that the Red Robe couldn’t see it, either. 

The possibility of a concealment charm was looking more and more likely, though it wouldn’t explain why Taako alone could see them. 

It was when the Red Robe lost its patience and floated out of the big guy’s reach, leading to Magnus positioning himself directly beneath them and flail his arms, “Oh look at me, I’m the Red Robe. Bleh” that Taako was convinced the occasion demanded a magic missile and aimed the umbra staff at Magnus. There was a chance it would catch the other lich in the crossfire, but it had already demonstrated intangibility, and to be honest, Taako didn’t really think of its safety as a priority. 

Before he could fire off the spell, though, the strange lich was overlapped by his own. Throwing his hands up, Taako snapped, “What’s the issue? You just said he was incorporeal. What do you care if I blast him with magic missile? And why are you protecting him, anyway?”

He waited for the lich to reply, hoping that it wouldn’t pull the same card everyone seemed to be playing and try to keep him in the dark.

It hesitated. There was a burst of garbled static, a resigned sigh, and then, _I **can’t** tell you._

__With its hood lowered, it looked as regretful as it sounded, but Taako had no use for regret. He wanted answers. Bitterly, he turned aside, allowing his gaze to settle on anything else while he grumbled, “Yeah? What else is new?”_ _

After observing the seemingly one-sided conversation in silence, the other lich drifted closer, its gaze locked on the umbra staff. _“Where did you get that?”_

But Taako’s temper wasn’t faring any better after the stonewalling he’d received, so he snapped, “I stole this off some dead dude.” And Merle and Magnus chimed him to back him up on that, though neither seemed certain if the dude was dead before or shortly after they’d found him. 

While they bickered, the Red Robe began to quiver and clutch at its hood, its form becoming indistinct and unstable. 

Taako’s lich glanced over its shoulder, and upon witnessing the burgeoning breakdown, demanded of the wizard, _Tell him, ‘She’s safe.’_

But Taako stubbornly crossed his arms, “Dude, I’m not your messenger boy. Tell him yourself.” 

And for the first time since Taako had known it, the lich shuddered with rage. Bolts of scarlet lightning erupted from its robe, with one of them nearly clipping Magnus, though he’d dodged at the last second. 

It roared, _**TELL HIM!**_

And Taako backed up rapidly, suddenly frightened at a level that felt foreign, as though it’d been placed within in him, then pointed the umbra staff directly at the lich. It was still overlapped with the Red Robe. There was howl, a screech, a shriek, and then both of them were gone. 

And time resumed. 

 

___**The Eleventh Hour** _ _ _

Taako’s lich didn’t speak to him for a while after that. 

The next time Taako saw it, they weren’t standing outside Lucas’ lab, anymore. Instead, they were standing outside a portal connected to the B.O.B., talking to Avi while a purple worm several miles long arced over their heads. 

The Red Robe materialized behind Avi, who didn’t notice because the crimson outline that had appeared when time stopped was keeping him frozen and unaware. The Red Robe said it was proud of them, which seemed a little too radically divergent from a villain’s MO, unless Brian was taken into account, but he was an outlier in everyway and should in no way be counted for anything, ever. 

After Magnus helpfully reminded the lich that it was supposed to be a bad guy, its form began to shift and distort again. 

_Barry…_

Taako glanced up to see his lich, which he now saw was narrower in the shoulders than the Red Robe, “What did you say?” It made no indication that it had heard him, instead keeping its gaze on the Red Robe sinking into the floor, and Taako clicked his teeth in frustration, the desire to know how they knew each other burning unpleasantly beneath his skin. 

Since Taako hadn’t made much of an effort to obscure his speech, Magnus blinked at him in confusion, “Uh, I didn’t say anything. Merle, did you say something?" 

“Nah.” With a disinterested shrug, Merle added, “Maybe Pointy’s finally losing it.” 

After nodding tentatively in agreement, Magnus turned back to Taako, his eyes darting anxiously between the wizard and the empty space above his shoulder, “Uh, who’re you talking to, Taako?” 

At Taako’s heated glare, Magnus raised his arms in a placating gesture and backed up a step. 

_Trust Barry_

“Barry? He’s dead, though.” By this point, the Red Robe had ceased its shaking. Instead, it had become was utterly still as it listened to Taako’s apparently unprovoked rambling. “He died in Phandalin. We saw it happen. And it’s not like ‘Oh, maybe he jumped into a well and he’s okay’ the Chalice literally showed us the instant he was incinerated.” 

_Oh… right. Trust the creepy Red Robe, then. Not because he’s creepy, obviously – I mean, he’s actually a total dork…_ It seemed to deflate, losing some of its mystique in the process. _Look, I’m not here to argue with you. If it turns to shit, I’ll bail you out, so trust me when I say you should trust him._

Handily ignoring his audience, Taako gave the lich, whose speech patterns were beginning to feel uncomfortably familiar, a look that could cut through diamond, “Alright, let’s give this ol’ Crimson Cape a shot.” At the simultaneous exclamations of protest he received from his party, Taako shrugged nonchalantly, “He did kind of save our bacon, my dudes.” 

“Yeah,” Merle agreed with visible reluctance, “but a second ago you were agreeing with the rest of us that Mr. Twin Peaks over there couldn't be trusted. What happened to change yer mind?” 

Holding up a single finger, Taako shook his head, “First of all, Spooky wishes he were that cool.” The Red Robe seemed to consider taking offense to this. “And second of all, I’ve got it on good information that we can trust him. And, honestly, what’s the worst that could happen?” 

 

___**Lunar Interlude IV** _ _ _

So, things had been going rather well on Taako’s date with Kravitz. And how did he know it was a date and not an exceptionally pleasurable business meeting? Well, you didn’t take a handsome man or reaper of Kravitz’s caliber to a classy place like the Chug & Squeeze without developing some inkling of romantic attraction, and Taako, in his somewhat intoxicated state, was definitely feeling the magnetism. 

Until Kravitz decided to ruin the atmosphere. Something must have blipped on his radar, because one second he was laughing at a joke Taako had made, and the next he was tensed with alarm, a scythe materializing in his hand as his face fell away to reveal the stark white bone underneath, “There’s something here.” 

“I know,” Taako said dreamily, clinging to him, “I feel it, too.” 

Embarrassed, the reaper gently put some space between them, “No, no, not that. I mean – It was in the Miller’s lab, too.” His hollow sockets darted desperately at their surroundings, as though whatever he was sensing might launch an attack from the shadows shifting around them. “It’s dead and it’s powerful and it’s,” he glanced at Taako with suspicion, “extremely close.” With increasing agitation, Kravitz closed the distance he’d been keeping between himself and the wizard, demanding, “Are you harboring a dark spirit, Taako? Do you have suspicions that you might be some sort of vessel?” And finally, with an expression dancing on the edge of heartbreak, he asked, “You’re not a lich, are you?” 

“Um… not to my knowledge? I’m pretty sure that’s a solid negative, bubbelah.” 

“Right, right, I would have known if you were.” The reaper, who was endearingly easy to read, appeared indescribably relieved by the assurance. “And you’re sure you’re not harboring an undead spirit or anything? “ 

“Well, it’s been a while…” Taako hedged, “I could be? Could there be a dark spirit in my hat?” 

“I don’t – I don’t think so.” 

Hearing that, Taako tossed the hat aside just a smidge too quickly to be casual, and then knelt down to start unpacking his other magical items, listing each and every one of them off for Kravitz to check for traces of necromancy, but Kravitz had already decided it wasn’t his items, not even the umbrella that seemed to charge an attack when his back was turned, so he bid Taako a quick, fond farewell, thanked him for the evening, and then tore a rift between this plane and the Astral Plane to report to the Raven Queen. 

When he was sure he was gone, Taako retrieved and stored his items, then went to fetch his hat. Immediately after settling it on his head, he heard a dryly amused, Subtle. 

“Oh, shut up.” Taako grumbled, as he began to make his way back to the moon base, “You’re lucky I covered for you.” 

The lich hesitated visibly, with even the supernatural billowing of its cloak coming to an abrupt halt. Unaware of its cessation of motion, Taako continued several strides before his senses alerted him to the growing distance between him and the faint, cloying touch of necromantic magic. He spun around, a question on his lips, before a dry rasp in his mind uttered five words that the lich would later refuse to explain. 

_…He wasn’t talking about me._

 

___**Story and Song** _ _ _

Taako knew he was toast the moment he realized that the shadow of a gigantic disembodied hand had fallen over him. Knowing that his death was near was really making him reconsider his life choices, the most recent of which was breaking the umbra staff over his knee. It was the strongest weapon they had on their side, but given the chance to relive the last five minutes, Taako was sure he’d do it again. The truth was he’d rather die than wait even a second longer to free his sister. 

However, with that said, it wasn’t exactly Plan A. 

Still, if he took his feelings out of the equation, Lup was a lich that could shoot fire from her hands and stop time on a whim. As far as their fighting force went, her gain would more than make up for his loss. 

After all, what was the value of a Rook when compared to a Queen? 

And yet, she was right there. Terrifying and awesome, phantasmal and resplendent with a scarlet cloak whipping about her shadowy form like a storm. 

When a red haze outlined the appendage, arresting its movement, instincts old and new competed, because there was more than two centuries where he could always count on his sister, and they were fresh and raw and new in his mind, but overlapping with those were his memories of his lich, a being which had always been as present and constant as his own shadow. 

He wasn’t surprised to see the lich hovering over him, an ethereal wind whipping its hair and clothes. It pushed back its hood to reveal the inky black mass that formed delicate, elven features and glowing white eyes that burned with the fury of a supernova. 

The hand’s flesh blackened and curled back from its fingertips, exposing white bone to the air, and then that too became charred and stained, before it all crumbled into ash. 

Its job done, the lich’s form began to fade. It didn’t expect Taako to make a grab for its crimson robe, nor the outright pleading expression he fixed him with as he begged, “Don’t go. Not this time”. 

The lich’s image solidified, though Taako still felt nothing where his fingers passed through it. A pained whisper ground over bone, _I can’t stay._

But they both knew that wasn’t true. Because Taako needed Lup, had always and would always need her. The long and short of it was, no version of Taako, dead or alive, could ever leave their sister behind. And the proof was in the umbrella Taako had carried with him for over a year, without even knowing who she was or how he knew, Taako had always carried her with him. Nothing, not even transforming into a lich, could erase the bond that always brought them together. And if that was true for Lup, then it was even more true for her twin, her brother, her heart. 

From behind them, a shriek of unbridled rage could be heard, and while hearing Lup again was literally the best feeling in the world, it was also the worst time possible for her protective instincts to pick up right where they’d left off, “ _YOU!_ ” Oh, this was so bad. “GET YOUR CREEPY POSEUR BUTT AWAY FROM MY BROTHER!” 

 

It took significantly less convincing to get everyone to believe in the lich’s claims than it had anticipated. Magnus claimed that he and Taako gave off the same aura, something spiked and barbed that contained and protected the warmth hidden within it. 

They used Lup’s lipstick to build her a new, perfect, flawless body, and Taako’s own blood to build one for the lich. He probably could have gotten away with spitting in the glass cylinder, but he figured this was the only time he would get to grow a clone and he wanted to make the most of it, creepy cult stuff included. 

Intellectually, he’d known that any clone of him wouldn’t carry the same wrongness that saturated his skin, the off-putting shift of his features that he’d never quite gotten accustomed to seeing in his reflection, yet seeing his own image stand in front of him sans Wonderland’s lasting influence was harder than he’d imagined it would be. It felt as though he was staring, not at a clone, but at the real Taako, as if _he_ were the cheap test tube knock-off. 

And since his lich had spent over a decade tuning into his thoughts and his ever fluctuating moods, the sudden bitterness clawing at his insides like a feral beast didn’t go unnoticed for long. Though he didn’t acknowledge it with words, the former lich managed to catch his eye with a knowing expression. They both knew the pain of losing what was so fundamental to their identity that they felt empty and hollow without it. Compared to losing Lup and a hundred years worth of memories with a family he’d forgotten he’d had, a little cosmetic glamouring every now and then wasn’t anything worth crying over. For that reason, the former lich never tried to dull his looks or dim his inner light, for it would have been an action motivated by pity, and Taako deserved better. 

The others could never quite wrap their heads around having three identical elves running around and causing mischief, especially when two were actually the same person, but the former lich did well to differentiate himself. He was sullen and withdrawn, often sitting up with a start whenever someone addressed him, as though he hadn’t yet grown accustomed to being seen by anyone whose name wasn’t Taako. 

It wasn’t obvious at first, how this funhouse mirror version of the Taako they knew and loved was avoiding them. It started with him cutting a few meals short, the timing usually coinciding with whenever Lup deigned to join, and she may have had a mischievous streak a mile wide but that didn’t keep her from noticing. 

In the end, Taako tracked the former lich down, and after finding him sitting alone in the kitchen at an unPanly hour, opened his mouth to give voice to some of the choice words he’d been saving up for him, only to be interrupted before he could even speak. 

“She’s not my sister.” The former lich had his head in his hands as he stared resolutely at the knots in the wooden surface, locks of white gold hair falling over his technicolor eyes. The statement was short and final, an argument to win the day before his opponent could mount a defense. 

He didn’t expect Taako’s noise of outrage, nor did he expect slender elf to grab fistfuls of his cloak, lift him bodily out of his seat, and then slam him against the wall with enough force to make his head rock back with a painful crack. “Of course she is!” Taako shouted at him, “It doesn’t matter if she’s a lich or a fuckin’ umbrella, Lup will always be our sister!” 

But force had never worked with the wizard, either of them. They were too stubborn, too strong-willed, too guarded. Taako watched in dismay as his own face shut down, becoming shuttered and blank, “What do you care what I think?” 

Slowly, Taako released his lich, breathed, and created some space between them by taking a step back. He rubbed a palm over his face. “Listen, I remember a life where it was just us, just me and Lup against the universe. She was all I had and all I needed.” His lich nodded, showing that he was following. “And then I remember a life where it was just me. And I was never enough, but you, my spooky friend, made it bearable. I was empty but at least I wasn’t alone.” 

“You have Lup now.” His other self told him earnestly, “You found her.” 

“ _We_ found her.” Taako instantly corrected him. “And she will always be my number one, and slots 2-6 – no, wait, eight? Nine? Anyway, I’m sure there are slots still open for you if you’re up for it.” 

“Oh? And when exactly did your heart grow three sizes?” 

Dancing towards the stove with light steps, Taako responded with a lilt like a song, “Probably around the time Lup started having an extra helping of cake with dessert, if you know what I’m saying.” 

“What was that last bit, Taako?” Lup’s head popped into the kitchen with fire burning in her eyes, violently startling the room’s original occupants, who had learned to fear her unannounced appearances, and the next thing they knew, Taako’s clone body was face first on the ground while the lich floated in stunned silence above it. 

Lup’s gaze darted between the two, a guilty grin on her face, “Oops.” 

**Author's Note:**

> You know, for ages I thought that Barry Bluejeans first died because Davenport accidentally tilted the Starblaster and he just... fell off of it. I knew very little about Adventure Zone at the time, so my first thought was, "How unfortunate." Then I started listening to the podcast and Barry broke my heart like five times. I wanted to write somebody in his corner when he was interacting the Tres Horny Boys, and a memory for Taako where he wasn't alone. 
> 
> PS: Liches fall out of their bodies when they're startled. This has been a PSA.


End file.
